This is a thread for anyone who may have had similar problems to myself getting the shuffle to "randomize" things in a not-so random way. Maybe you guys had this all figured out, but I didn't see anything in the FAQ (more likely, I'm the only person who cares, but hey, there might be one more out there).

Ok, so my co-worker (who also has an empeg) says I am high maintainence with my music (which is very true). I like to listen to albums, but I also enjoy a good mix of genres (Rock, Pop, etc.) I have massive playlists for "Jeff Radio", which are supposed to act like Radio stations without talking and with my own favorites (there are always album cuts radio stations don't play, like everything by Rush ) Problem is I have a few requirements when it comes to "Jeff Radio":
- I don't like the same artist back 2 back very often
- I would like some songs in heavier rotation than others
- I like slow songs, but only once in a while
- I don't like getting a ton of a sub-genre in the middle of my mix (like 3 blues/rock songs in a row in my "rock list").

So here's how I fixed my problem: I created a playlist called "Rock Mix" and put a bunch of playlists below it. Some of these are favorites, some are sub-genres, and others are artist specific (like Rush) that I want to hear once every time through the list. I then set all of these lists to select one song at random when they are played instead of playing the whole list. If I have 30 sub-lists this generates a good mix of 30 songs, meeting all of my requirements above (except I do get artists repeating, but not very often). I can even put new music I am not sure of in the mix to play infrequently so I am always finding new stuff I didn't know I had.

Of course, I want more than 30 songs, so I go into the "Rock Radio" list and copy the "Rock Mix" about 20 times. The mix list will pick a (mostly) different mix every time through giving me an awesome mix. The only wierd part (I don't think its a bug, but I wish it worked a little differently) is that I have to copy the "Rock Mix" lists several times instead of turning on "Repeat" because the "Repeat" command simply reshuffles the already selected playlist instead of picking new songs.

Sorry for the long post, I am just SO STOKED with my player now that I figured out how to do this (It makes such a difference with my wife's country list because there is so much slow country music, it was getting hard to listen to without always skipping songs).

Now if I only had cross fading . . .

-Jeff

Wow, that's very clever. Cool.